More Tales from the SSUVFL

 

It is hard to believe that it has been two weeks since we closed down the food trailer for the season. It seems like ages since we were in there slinging soup like wild people. Lisa has been busy making plans for next season so that she has her ducks in a row when the shiitake mushrooms hit the fan. 

What have we done in the last fourteen days. For starters, Lisa made a list. We need to prioritize what needs to get done around here before the snow flies.

Everything above the black line are Lisa's jobs. Below that is mine. I ask you, whose list is longer and more complete? Normally I will start working on the list after I have finished my daily chores. Which are the dishes, laundry, make the bed and the million other things that make a house a home. So I have been a little busy. Where's Lisa you ask? Why isn't she helping me? Good questions. Lisa has decided to pursue her career in the Geriatric Arts. She decided to go back to her job for the winter at the local nursing home. Maybe she thinks that she will be better able to take care of me. I don't know. 

We also found time to watch the grandkids over the Columbus Day holiday.

Here they are scarfing down DQ Blizzards.

Back in my day, my brother, sister and I were lucky if we could split a Dilly bar three ways after we walked the 10 miles to the DQ in 100 degree heat, uphill, both ways. Kids these days. We had a fun sleepover and I made my famous popcorn from scratch. They call it "Pops corn". Get it? Because they call me Pop.

One day we drove to the megatropolis called Fargo for the youngest one's fifth birthday. 

The boys really like hockey so we all went to a Fargo Force hockey game.

It was our first game in that arena and it was fun to watch. Lots of stuff going on besides the game. It was a fun evening for sure.

On the cabin front. I made some doors. One door is for the closet that surrounds our circuit breaker box. That used to be out in the barn but now is in our family room. The other is a barn door for our bedroom.

Bedroom

Closet

I was also able to get the trim around the top of our ceiling in the bedroom along with the mirrors. (Just seeing if anyone has read this far. I really didn't put mirrors up on the ceiling. Yet.)

Here is the kitten segment. We have had the kitten for over a week now. She has settled down quite a bit. In fact, when you go to pick her up, she starts purring and snuggles right into your arms. Then she is sleeping in no time.

As of today we have named her Stinky. Because she still smells a little skunky, but with a face and personality that she has it's hard to keep calling her Stinky. So that may change. We have had her at the vet and they said that she was about 6 months old which is what we thought. In fact we just picked her up from the vet this morning after getting her spayed. She is doing fine and will get a lot of pampering now. 

On a personal note. Jim thinks that I am a dog hater. I wouldn't say that I hate dogs. If you were to ask me if I could have a dog or a cat, I would always choose the cat. I guess it's time to go outside and kick some puppies, according to Jim. LOL. JK. I am not going to kick puppies! 

Tales from the SSUVFL

The SSUVFL stands for Super Secret Undisclosed Virus Free Location. I just thought that I would share that with anyone who happens to read this and doesn't know what I am referring too. It is what we call our home somewhere in Minnesota. Those that have been here are sworn to secrecy under penalty of a vicious herpes outbreak, should they choose to divulge the location. ( I'm talking to you Jethro!)

This past week I got up out of bed to use the facility like so many old people due all night long. I often go to our front door and look out at our surroundings. Ever watchful for marauders, Sasquatches and the relentless politician. Lo and behold! What do my wandering eyes see? A kitten. Right out in front of our front door. So I hastily shuffle back to the bedroom to get my glasses to make sure that I saw what I saw. Sure enough. A kitten. So I went to our garage door and opened to see if the kitten would come to me but it ran away. So I put out some food for it and went to bed. That was at 3:18 AM. What!?

In the morning the food looked like it was partially eaten. We then started working on "Operation Kitten Rescue". The second night I saw the kitten come for food around 11 pm.

So I went to the door again and it ran soon as it heard the door open. Well, that's not working. I thought for sure I could run over there and with my Ninja like reflexes capture it. But once a black cat runs out into the night it is very hard to see.

Day 3. Plan "B" had to be developed. Lisa's mom has a live trap so I went over to borrow that from her. The trap was set and all we had to do was wait.

Now you can tell from my commentary on the videos how shocked I was. That raccoon was way too fat to even get in the cage. Good thing because I wouldn't know what to do if he did. That was the first visitor of the evening. A little while later we had another visitor.

I really amaze myself with my commentary. Why was I not a play by play sports announcer? 

You can tell by my voice that we have made a grave mistake. I ran into the bedroom to wake up sleeping beauty to tell her the good news. I said excitedly "We caught something!" All she said was "What, a skunk?" She's a mind reader now. Well I had to get it out of the cage. Here is where Lisa gave me a hand.

I did not get sprayed. However the cage took a direct hit. Boy, did that stink. Well that was enough fun for night 3.

Day 4. I set up the cage again but didn't have high hopes since it stunk so bad. 

Who would have ever thought that if you put a little bit of cat food out by your front door that you would get so many animals visiting. So at the end of night 4, I didn't really think that we would have any luck. We have not seen the kitten for 2 nights now and with the fox sighting I was sure that it was his dinner at one time.

Day 5. I was really hesitant about putting more food out. Not knowing what was going to show up next. I mean we haven't seen the bear yet. Plus that cage reeks of skunk. I sprinkled a little food in it and checked it the next morning. Nothing. Poured my coffee and looked at the Facebook. Coffee done and wisdom accomplished, I checked the trap again.

We finally caught it. It is kind of feral so we don't know what we are going to do with it. We are hoping to turn it into a barn cat. We have had it for several days now and it will let us pick it up and hold it. It does like that because it will purr and purr.

Did I tell you that the kitten also smells like skunk? It does, from being in the same cage that a skunk sprayed. It is smelling better after several days though. I guess I owe my mother-in-law a new cage. LOL.

So that is our excitement for the week.

I also wanted to add one more thing that I forgot to mention in our past posts. We sold our fifthwheel. We decided to sell it because we have not used it in two years and not using them is hard on them also. So hopefully the next owner will get as much enjoyment out of it as we did. 

It was a sad day when that left. Just looking back at all of the places we have been to with that. The adventures we had in it. The years that we lived in it. So we are no longer full-time RVers. Not even part timers. We still have our pickup camper if we get the urge to go somewhere.

Until inspiration hits me again.

Soup Trailer Wrap Up

 

 

Soup Season end.

The day has finally arrived. We had our last event of the season. We are done slinging soup and sandwiches. We started mid April and ended mid October. 80 events this year as opposed to 92 last year.

Now let me get into some numbers. There's not a day that goes by when I don't get a message from Harry. Always asking us how much soup we sold. If you ask him about it he will deny it. He is so obsessed with soup for some reason. In fact he messaged us saying that he had a great idea for soup. He thought it would be awesome if we could sell deep fried soup on a stick. What?! To which I had to ask if he had been talking to Jim. Jim's idea was to puree our meatball hoagie so that he could eat it like soup. Talk about a couple of weirdos.

So, the numbers. 2,925 transactions for 2024 versus 2,596 for 2023. 1,747 sandwiches for 2024 as opposed to 1,520 sandwiches in 2023. Now the soup totals. 803 12 oz. bowls of soup for 2024. Down a little from 2023 of 919 bowls. 75 gallons for 2024. 86 gallons for 2023.  8 oz. cups of soup. 674 in 2024 and 321 for 2023. That makes 42 gallons of soup compared to 2023's 20 gallons. This year we did soup/sandwich combos. That is why the cups were up. Plus for sandwiches you need to add 473 half sandwiches to the 1,747 full sandwiches. So in a nutshell, we sold 117 gallons of soup. Harry and Jim did not buy one ounce. I really don't know why they are so concerned about it.

We are so done for the season. As a sign from above, our trailer said that it was also done for the year. We were backing it into the barn when we noticed one tire going flat.

Luckily, we got it in the barn and will take care of it later. 

Something I would like to share from the other day. Minnesota has four seasons. Summer has ended now and fall is here and as always, the weather gets cooler. Don't get alarmed. It's not climate change as so many people try to scare you with. Actually it is, but our climate here changes 4 times a year.

Anyways, I walk into our new living room and it is kind of cool. I notice that Lisa has the window wide open. I also noticed that Lisa is sitting in her recliner dressed like this. She has on heavy duty hiking socks, leggings, a thermal long sleeve shirt, a hoody over that, and wrapped in a blanket. 

I said to her, "What are you doing?"

"I'm sitting on my heating pad because my back hurts" was her reply.

"Why's the window open?" I said. "It's cold in here".

To which she says this. "I'm hot."

So many things went through my mind. Like, take off the hoody? Take off the blanket? Turn down the heating pad? 

What are we going to do with all this free time now? We still have time to enjoy our property.

The fall colors are in full bloom right now. With fall we get a few nuisance insects. With cool nights and warm days these bugs are trying to get into warm places. Namely our house. One is Black flies.

These were trapped between the window and screen. I don't even know how they got in there. They will find their way into the house. At least once a day I will go around to all of the windows with the vacuum hose and suck them up. I have named this daily ritual "The Bug Suck".

The second annoying bug is the "Asian Beetle".

I hate those things with a passion. They seek out warm areas and right now the warmest thing around is our house. They are literally crawling all over the house trying to get in. Also, if you are outside trying to enjoy the last few warm days, the bugs crawl all over you. Now you are just supposed to brush them off because if you swat them, they emit a foul stench and leave an orange stain on your skin or clothes. But it is really hard not to swat them because those little b***ards bite. 

They are an invasive species now with very few predators. 

We will also have time to finish the house. We would surely like to get that done soon. So, more news after we decompress for awhile.